Rocker-recliner chairs are of course old in the prior art as a general category of chair. One type of rocker-recliner that has been in use for many years basically consists of a standard recliner chair whose armrests are mounted on rocker cams to provide the desired rocking movement. The seat is mounted to the armrests for movement relative to the armrest when the chair is moved to TV position which movement is effected by pushing off the armrests to exert pressure on the backrest which pivots rearwardly relative to the seat while the seat moves rearwardly relative to the armrests. This movement of the seat is achieved through a linkage mechanism mounting the seat to the armrests to provide a certain amount of translational movement of the seat relative to the armrests in the rearward direction of the chair. While these chairs have certainly gained acceptance in the industry, they are limited in the respect that they cannot accommodate a T-cushion styling because the seat is mounted to move relative to the armrests. Additionally, the chair consumes a large space because of the mounting of the armrests on the rocker cams and because of the translational movement of the seat relative to the armrests when moving into reclining positions. Moreover, the chair is susceptible to lurching rearwardly when the footrest is extended to place the chair in TV position. To overcome this possibility, it is necessary to add some means to overcome or inhibit the tendency of the chair to lurch.
Other types of rocker recliners have been developed with the object of reducing the space requirements of the chairs of the type described above. In these chairs, the seat and backrest do not move relative to the rocker cams when the footrest is extended to place the chair in TV position. While these chairs allowed T-cushion styling and reduced the space requirements of the chair, they created a forward-lurching problem because the seat did not move relative to the cams to compensate for lurching when the footrest was extended. In a more recent rocker-recliner of my invention disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,319,780, issued Mar. 16, 1982, a "wall-avoiding" mechanism is provided by a seat which moves forwardly relative to the rocker-cam linkage in going to TV position. However, this enhances the tendency of the chair to lurch forwardly when moving to TV position.